Sheriff Mourns Deputy, Calls for Death Penalty

The day after a sheriff’s deputy was slain while intervening in a domestic dispute near Ojai, Ventura County Sheriff Larry Carpenter said he will ask prosecutors to seek the death penalty against the accused killer--a repeat criminal who allegedly ran naked from his house firing at officers with two semiautomatic handguns.

Carpenter said his department would be reviewing training procedures in the wake of the fatal shooting. Though Carpenter said he saw no procedural errors in the case, police experts said Thursday that the slain rookie patrolman made a tactical error by walking into the suspect’s home alone and with his gun in its holster.

The sheriff directed most of his comments Thursday to his hope that prosecutors will deal harshly with Michael Raymond Johnson, 48.

“I want the death penalty,” Carpenter said after praising rookie patrol Officer Peter John Aguirre, 26, a former divinity student who died Wednesday evening.

Dist. Atty. Michael D. Bradbury said prosecutors will file first-degree murder charges with a special circumstance against Johnson, which would make a death sentence possible if he is convicted. Bradbury said he had not decided whether to seek the death penalty.

Carpenter would not detail Johnson’s criminal history, which extends into Georgia and Missouri, but sources said the suspect was convicted of theft in 1968 and has been sentenced to state and federal prisons for narcotics, burglary, robbery and firearm violations. He was sentenced in 1987 to more than five years in prison for a robbery in Santa Monica and burglaries in Van Nuys and Ojai.

Prosecutors said Johnson, who was shot in the midsection by a deputy before being arrested outside his Meiners Oaks house, is scheduled for arraignment today. He remained in intensive care at Ventura County Medical Center on Thursday in stable condition.

Carpenter said there was no indication that Johnson, a recovering alcoholic who has been convicted of selling drugs, was intoxicated when he allegedly shot Aguirre three times as the officer stepped inside the man’s small rented home after responding to a complaint of a domestic dispute involving a firearm.

The suspect, who allegedly had been holding his wife hostage but was showering when four deputies arrived, fired eight to 12 rounds at officers as he fled his house, Carpenter said. Deputy Jim Freyhoff, ducking behind a tree, returned fire, hitting Johnson once, Carpenter said.

Word that Johnson had engaged in a gun battle with officers surprised those who have worked with him at Oxnard College and drug and alcohol centers in the last three years. They said it seemed that he was trying to turn his life around.

Johnson had excelled in drug counseling classes at Oxnard College in 1994, according to his instructor, William Shilley, and had worked at at least two drug and rehabilitation centers as a volunteer counselor since then.

But Carpenter told reporters at an afternoon press conference that there is no doubt who killed Aguirre, a rookie patrol officer he described as one of his department’s most promising.

“He was a good deputy, very well thought of . . . and very, very sincere about helping those who were not as fortunate,” the sheriff said.

In the quiet community of Santa Paula, where the Aguirre family has lived for 70 years, relatives gathered at the home of Aguirre’s parents, recalling him as shy and kind. Among them were his wife, Enedina, and 3-year-old daughter, Gabriella.

Peter Aguirre Jr., who earned a bachelor’s degree in religious studies at Cal State Northridge, was the first member of the family to go to college, relatives said. At one point he considered going into the priesthood and teaching, but opted for a career in law enforcement, according to his grandfather, Don Aguirre.

Aguirre joined the Sheriff’s Department in mid-1994 and served at the County Jail until January, when he was transferred to patrol duties in bucolic Ojai. After a four-month training period, he became a full-fledged patrol officer about three months ago.

Aguirre was one of four deputies in two cruisers who responded when Johnson’s stepdaughter called for help about 5:25 p.m. Wednesday, saying that her mother was being held hostage and that a gun was involved, Carpenter said.

The sheriff and others gave this account:

Aguirre spoke briefly at the front door with a distraught Guillermina Johnson, who was clad in a towel. She told him that her estranged husband was inside and had two guns.

Deputy Steve Sagely pulled her aside and Aguirre walked inside, his gun still in its holster. Sagely heard him say a word or two to Michael Johnson, then shots were heard. The other deputies fell back and Johnson came to the door, naked, brandishing two semiautomatic pistols.

Johnson allegedly fired several shots at the deputies, who ran for cover, firing back with their service pistols. By the time they looked up again, Aguirre lay on the ground, mortally wounded.

Law enforcement experts said Aguirre apparently made a fatal mistake by leaving his gun in its holster and walking alone into a home where he knew an armed suspect waited.

Carpenter was reluctant to criticize Aguirre’s actions or speculate on why he might have let his guard down. The sheriff said Johnson’s wife may have told the officer that he was still in the shower.

But other police experts said no officer should walk into a house where there is an armed suspect without at least having his gun in hand and a partner with him.